


A Fox amongst Wolves

by FallingAfterAlice



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Fencing, Love Triangles
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-06
Updated: 2019-07-12
Packaged: 2020-06-22 23:52:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19684129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FallingAfterAlice/pseuds/FallingAfterAlice
Summary: At Kaer Morhen, Vesemir taught fencing.This is a Modern AU inspired by that idea, in which Vesemir is still the fencing master, and Eskel, Geralt and Lambert are his star pupils.They're training hard for the World Championships, the last major event of the competition season. Then Eskel falls for the newest member of their club, a certain pretty redhead. But Triss prefers her men white-haired rather than brown-haired...Eskel can’t help the way his own eyes are drawn to Triss, over and over, as Vesemir introduces her to Geralt and Lambert; so he sees the way her eyes keep flicking back towards Geralt, a pink flush staining her cheeks, and feels a stab of disappointment.But then she turns back to him – him and his scarred cheek – and the smile on her face is open and genuine and warm, and he feels a warm kernel of hope take root in his chest.





	1. September

Eskel is in the locker-room, looking for his keys, when she finds him. His back turned, he hears the footsteps first, and then –

“Hey. Are you Eskel?”

He glances over his shoulder at the newcomer, gaining a brief impression of red hair, and two very pretty, very green eyes. _The new girl. What’s her name again? Something with a T… Triss?_ He nods to her.

“Triss, right? Just a sec,” Eskel says, turning back to his locker as he searches through the pockets of his bag. His keys have to be in here somewhere – why is there always so much _crap_ in here – wait, that was a definite jingle –

“Found them,” he says with satisfaction, extracting them from the bottom of a deep pocket he would swear he never uses. He shoves them into his jeans, and braces himself for what is to come.

 _Best get it over with quickly,_ he thinks, then shuts the door of his locker and turns around to face the girl.

To her credit, she barely starts when she sees his face. Barely.

At twenty-nine, Eskel knows he is too old to still care so much about what people think of his face. But that doesn’t change the fact that he does care, and he will never grow used to the stares, the flinches, and the occasional looks of disgust.

It’s not his unrefined features that bother him; Eskel thinks he could live with heavy brows and a wide jaw, if only it weren’t for the scar that marred his cheek, pulling at the corner of his lip. The scar is the last remnant of the childhood car accident that tore his face apart, inexpertly stitched by the only plastic surgeon his family could afford. The familiar knot in his stomach tightens, and he does his best, as usual, to ignore it.

The girl – young woman, really – is gorgeous, in contrast to himself. Her flaming red hair is tied neatly behind her head, and her delicate mouth curves in a friendly smile that touches her striking green eyes. She is way too young for him, though. She looks to be, oh, twenty, twenty-one –

 _Stop it,_ he chides himself, and smiles at her instead, with the unscarred half of his mouth.

“Welcome to the club. Vesemir said you’d stop by; asked me to give you the grand tour.”

“Oh, great. Vesemir – he’s the one with the grey ponytail? The old fencing master?”

Eskel nods. “Yeah, that’s the one. The sabre coach. He founded the club, back in the day.” He pauses, eyes her slim frame, wonders. “What weapon do you fence?”

“Foil,” she says, proudly, and Eskel chuckles. He guessed right. “What a shame,” he says, though his eyes crinkle with amusement. “You should try a real weapon some time, like sabre.”

Triss giggles, and he sees she is familiar with the well-worn tradition of inter-weapon rivalry. “I like to use skill and strategy when I fence - I think I’d get bored of the mindless violence,” she teases.

He leads her towards the door, and starts the tour.

“Okay, so as you can see, you’ve already managed to find the locker room - first door to your left after you enter the building. You can have any of the free lockers, and you can keep your fencing gear here, all your weapons and clothes and whatever else you want. Just make sure to bring your own lock, or your stuff might go missing.” He glances at her sidelong. “Normally it’s the guys who need to hear this more than the ladies, but just in case: it’s not for _permanent_ storage, and you’re supposed to take your sweaty whites home and wash them regularly, otherwise the place will smell even worse than it already does.”

“Oh, I can imagine,” she says, with a giggle. She wrinkles her nose in sympathy. There is a light dusting of freckles across the tip of her nose that he has to drag his eyes away from.

He continues down the small hallway, pointing out the change rooms (men on the left, women on the right), the store room hung with spare masks, jackets, and breeches, and the small office that Vesemir uses for club records and trophies. The last room near the end of the hallway is the club’s armoury, stocked with foils, epees and sabres, as well as the tools necessary to fix most equipment failures. He is pleased to see an impressed gleam in her eyes.

“My old club didn’t have anything like this,” she says, taking a foil from one of the racks on the wall. She turns, testing the point against a worn training dummy in the corner of the room.

Eskel shrugs, watches her. “We’re pretty lucky here. The old wolf – that’s Vesemir – inherited enough money to buy this place and kit it out properly. But that was something like forty years ago, so it’s starting to show its age, fall apart a bit.”

“Still looks pretty good to me,” Triss says, taking a step back and then lunging at the dummy, her point fixing in the centre of its chest.

“Where were you before this?” Eskel asks. Her form is good, if a bit stiff. She needs to relax her back shoulder.

“I started fencing a few years ago in Vizima, just a small club,” Triss says as she hangs the foil back on the rack. “I moved here a month ago for law school – Kaedwen has some of the best on the Continent, and I got into the Ban Ard Academy.”

“Congrats,” Eskel says, and he means it. Even he knows the Academy’s world-class reputation. “Law, huh? Remind me never to get on your bad side.”

His mind leaps ahead, trying to do the maths. She is here for law school. That means the pretty red-head has to be older than she looks, probably more like twenty-four, maybe even twenty-five…

There is an amused expression on Triss’s face, and Eskel realises with a start that he has no idea what she just said. Thankfully, she doesn’t seem to be waiting for a reply. He is glad she can’t read his mind - nor hear the way his heart speeds up when her amused smile becomes a grin.

He continues the tour.

Out of the hallway, down the stairs, and out into the salle, the large open space taking up the heart of the building. The squeak of rubber-soled shoes and the electric beep of the scoring machines is audible from the stairwell.

Triss gasps as she enters the salle behind him, and Eskel feels another prickle of pride for his fencing club, for his second home. One half of the space is currently empty, and like in any gym, a myriad of lines are painted on the floor to delineate the courts of various ballsports. (They have to play _something_ when they aren’t fencing, after all. Eskel has developed a mean volleyball serve over the last year or two...)

The other half of the salle is set up with eight permanent fencing pistes, wires strung from the ceiling and scoring machines fixed to the walls at either end of the strip.

Two sabreurs are fencing on the piste closest to them, and the grey-haired figure of Vesemir watches from the side. He turns when he hears Eskel and Triss enter, and waves them over to watch. Eskel knows the two fencers so well he can recognise them at a glance. The one on the left is tall and broad-shouldered, like himself, and leans forward in his en garde position, shoulders a little hunched. His opponent is a little shorter, a little slimmer, and carries his weight on the balls of his feet. Geralt and Lambert. His training partners, his team-mates, his friends.

As they watch, Geralt attacks, three quick steps followed by a lunge; Eskel knows from long experience just how hard it is to block the flurry of movement that is Geralt’s attack. But Lambert is ready for him, ready with a parry and a riposte – only, he misses on the riposte, his blade sailing past Geralt without hitting. Geralt presses his advantage, twists, moving impossibly fast, and –

The scoring machine _pings_ : one red light. Geralt’s point.

Evidently, it was the last point of their bout, as the two fencers salute each other, then take their masks off.

“Don’t forget the aim is to actually hit the other person,” Geralt teases with a grin. He runs a hand through his white hair, pulling the loose strands away from his face.

“Yeah, yeah,” Lambert grumbles good-naturedly. The two sabreurs shake hands and then turn to face their coach, awaiting his judgement.

“Not bad, not bad.” Vesemir steps forward, arms crossed. “Lambert, you’re still pulling your arm back on your ripostes. That’s why you missed that last one. If you had riposted straight away, like so – ba, ba!” the fencing master demonstrates a quick movement with his arm – “then you would have hit him.”

He turns to the white-haired sabreur. “As for you, Geralt, that wasn’t bad overall but keep working on changing up the tempo of those steps – your attack was too predictable, and Lambert knew exactly when it would end and was ready with a parry.”

Triss glances at Eskel, her eyebrows raised.

“That’s… _the_ Geralt? Of Rivia?” she asks under her breath, as Vesemir continues discussing the bout with his students.

Eskel resists the impulse to roll his eyes, and nods instead. Of course Triss has heard of Geralt. _Everyone_ in the fencing world has heard of Geralt: the sabreur with the striking white hair, the traditional masculine good looks, and the athletic talent to be four-time world champion at only thirty.

Eskel is a _three-_ time world champion, and nine months younger to boot, but he tries not to begrudge his friend his fame, knowing that it isn’t really Geralt’s fault, any more than the scar on his cheek is his own fault. Nevertheless, Eskel sometimes has to work hard to suppress his jealousy when he sees the easy way Geralt has with women. He knows no one else who is able to draw so many eyes with so little effort.

Eskel can’t help the way his own eyes are drawn to Triss, over and over, as Vesemir introduces her to Geralt and Lambert; so he sees the way her eyes keep flicking back towards Geralt, a pink flush staining her cheeks, and feels a stab of disappointment.

But then she turns back to him – him and his scarred cheek – and the smile on her face is open and genuine and warm, and he feels a warm kernel of hope take root in his chest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well... we're off to a good start! Boy oh boy, do I have some ups and downs planned for these guys (and girl).
> 
> Most of this fic is already written, and just needs a final edit, so I should be able to post pretty regularly...


	2. December

The party is alive by the time Eskel arrives, seething and throbbing, people spilling out of the door and into the garden. He parks around the corner and walks back to the house, zipping up his leather jacket against the chill winter air. He’s not usually one to be late, but there was that _incident_ with the runaway goat on the Forktail Freeway, and someone had to stay back to file the paperwork.

_And for some reason, it’s always me,_ he grumbles to himself. _You’d think I was the only cop who could read and write, the way they carry on about it._

By the time he reaches the door, he has shrugged it off. He is looking forward to this party: Vesemir’s annual end-of-year gathering, all members of the Wolf’s Claw Fencing Club invited. It’s loud and boozy, something Vesemir professes to hate, but he still holds it every year without fail (privately, Eskel suspects the old man just likes to grumble).

Eskel says hello to the familiar faces as he moves into the house. Three of the younger club members, all teenagers just out of high school, are sprawled in the hallway, and greet him enthusiastically. He almost doesn’t recognise Ciri, the ashen-haired student of Geralt’s; her eyes are ringed with black kohl, and she’s wearing a trendy top that leaves her midriff bare. It’s strange to see her all dressed up, out of her sports gear. The young fencers are laughing about some new internet meme; it makes him feel old, so he moves on, picking his way carefully over the tangle of legs.

A glance into an open door reveals the sitting room is full of epeeists, not all of whom he recognises; several foilists are perched on the counter-tops in the kitchen, arguing about a recent rule change. One of them offers him a beer; he accepts, then wanders off, looking for Geralt and Lambert.

He finds Lambert in the garden, chatting with Keira, a pretty blonde foilist, and that visiting sabreur from down south near Novigrad – Aiden. They are comparing the local cuisines and wines of their respective homelands. Eskel nods and drinks his beer and watches Lambert flirt with both fencers, seemingly unable to decide which of the two he wants to pursue. _Good luck with that_ , he thinks, but is mildly impressed to see that Keira and Aiden are both flirting back, so Eskel decides to leave them to it.

He snags a second beer on his way back through the kitchen and heads up the stairs, where he can hear raucous laughter that sounds a lot like that musician friend of Geralt’s, the one with the soul patch - Dandelion. He follows the sound and finds Dandelion sprawled on the floor of the small home office, the short epeeist Zoltan sitting cross-legged next to him, and Geralt spread out on the couch.

They greet Eskel enthusiastically, so he flops onto the couch next to Geralt. Dandelion is telling some ridiculous story in which Geralt is oblivious to the flirtatious hints of a certain blue-eyed singer. Eskel has heard this one before, but he doesn’t mind; Dandelion’s a good storyteller, and even he chuckles at the musician’s impressions of his stoic white-haired friend.

When he finishes his beer, Zoltan pours him a rum and coke, and makes one for Dandelion, too. “My specialty. None of that weak pre-mixed shit. It’s real Mahakaman rum and made properly strong, with a kick like a mule,” he says proudly as he passes Eskel the cup.

“You’ll regret it in the morning,” Geralt warns, but even though he’s ready for something rough, Eskel _still_ has to choke back a cough after the first sip.

“Kicks like something strong, alright,” Eskel says, once his throat has stopped burning. Zoltan chuckles, claps him on the back and tells him it will put some hair on his chest. Eskel tells him he’s not sure he wants _more_ hair than is already there, and they all collapse into laughter, until he is gasping, wheezing for air, and he has almost forgotten that he hasn’t seen Triss at this party yet.

Two rum and cokes later, the door at the end of the hallway opens, and Yen and Triss emerge, the former dressed in black, the latter in a burnt orange dress; _like night and day,_ the thought springs, unbidden, to Eskel’s mind. Yen glances toward the open door of the study; she nudges Triss and whispers into her ear, a mischievous look on her face. Triss giggles, then breaks out in laughter.

“What’s the joke, ladies?” Dandelion asks cheerfully as the two girls enter the room.

Yen snorts and shakes her head. “None of your business,” she says, and Eskel has to resist the impulse to roll his eyes. He has never been able to see quite what Geralt likes about her so much. The raven-haired beauty – that, he does not deny – might be dedicated, talented, and intelligent; she is a nationally-ranked pentathlete, a medical student, and rich to boot. But she is also decidedly what some would call _high maintenance_ or _highly strung_. Triss, on the other hand…

His gaze flickers to Triss, standing behind Yen’s shoulder, and he takes her in for the first time that night. She is, as always, gorgeous, in a low-cut, copper-coloured dress that somehow doesn’t clash with her red hair, but rather intensifies the green in her eyes. There is a smile on her face as she looks into the room, and Eskel has to remind himself not to stare.

Yen steps daintily across the room, tosses her dark hair over a shoulder and sits in Geralt’s lap. The white-haired sabreur puts an arm around her waist and places a kiss on her neck where it joins her shoulder, then whispers in her ear; Yen snorts and shakes her head, but a faint blush stains her pale cheeks. Eskel has a fair idea of what Geralt might have just suggested and rolls his eyes: he’s seen displays like these many times, whenever Geralt and Yen are in an ‘on’ phase of their on-and-off relationship.

“I’m going downstairs to get a drink,” Triss announces. Her face is tight, and there is something sad in her eyes; Eskel wonders where her dazzling smile went, and wishes he knew how to bring it back.

Dandelion glances at Geralt and Yen on the couch, then rolls his eyes and says something about going outside for a cigarette. None of the others smoke and Eskel knows he has had enough to drink for tonight, but he follows Dandelion and Triss out of the room anyway, Zoltan on his heels, leaving the two on the couch. He catches a glimpse through the still-open door as he makes his way down the stairs: Yen has turned and is now straddling Geralt’s lap, their mouths hungrily devouring each other. One of Geralt’s hands is already sliding up her thigh, under the black velvet of her dress.

Zoltan follows Dandelion outside but Eskel’s feet turn of their own volition and take him into the kitchen after Triss. She glances over her shoulder at him as he enters and offers him a glass of the red wine she is drinking, but he shakes his head; someone has left some rum on the counter and there is an open bottle of coke in the fridge so he pours himself another, even though he knows his head will regret it in the morning. At least this one goes down easier than Zoltan’s Mahakaman concoctions.

Triss puts the wine bottle away and turns to face him. Eskel has to drag his eyes up from the expanse of collarbone back to her face; gods, but she is beautiful in that dress. He has been unable to get her out of his head since she joined the fencing club three months ago; he’s wished several times that he knew how, since she is so far out of his league, but it doesn’t help that she’s also funny, and smart, and always seems happy to see him when they run into each other at the club.

She takes a step towards him, reaches a hand out and touches his leather jacket.

“Red suits you,” she says, looking up at him. Her smile is bright, but there is something brittle in it, as if it might shatter if he said the wrong thing.

“Thanks,” he manages to say. “It was the only one they had in my size.” That was the problem with being taller and broader than most other people. But he is not thinking about that, not now. His eyes and nose are full of the nearness of her: this close, he can almost make out the individual eyelashes, or count the freckles on her nose…

He can feel his scar itching. He should step back, and give her some room.

“I like your dress,” he says instead, though it’s not the dress he likes, it’s her in it. She smiles a little in response, and stays there, looking up at him, standing slightly too close. He sees her eyes flicker down, to his mouth, and he forgets about his scar and wonders if she is thinking about kissing him, like he is thinking about kissing her. Then she looks up at him again, and her eyes are so _green_ , they go right into his soul, so that he can’t help but reach out, and trace the curve of her cheek. He’s expecting her to pull away but instead she tilts her chin upwards, towards him, so he bends his head and presses his mouth to hers.

There is a moment before she responds where he thinks he has done the wrong thing, and his stomach drops; but then he feels her arms wrapping around him, her hands tracing over his shoulders, and she is kissing him back. He is almost unable to believe it but he pulls her close anyway, determined to make the most of it, and deepens the kiss, trying to show her how much he has wanted this, how much he wants her. Her mouth is soft and warm and her tongue tangles with his, and he can feel himself growing _hard_ inside his trousers –

He pulls back and breaks the kiss, breathing hard. She steps into him, smiles up at him from beneath her lashes, and this time it lights up her face, her eyes shining.

“Want to get out of here? I live just around the corner,” she says, and Eskel still can’t believe his luck, so when they go back to her place, he does his best to show her just how much he has wanted her, and gives her as much pleasure with his hands and his mouth as he can before he takes her, her legs wrapped tight around his hips, her head thrown back and her back arching into his chest, and it is perfect and everything he imagined it would be and nothing like what he imagined, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Eskel gets what he wants... but is it what Triss wants?


	3. May

They don’t _mean_ to polish off two bottles of vodka in a night, but Geralt and Yen are taking a break again, and even though Eskel and Lambert don’t like her, they are still Geralt’s friends, and will always be there to help him drown his sorrows.

The three sabreurs don’t usually drink much – they can’t afford to, what with the punishing schedule of work, training, and competitions that they each have to juggle.

But there is no competition this weekend, and there is a steely glint in Geralt’s eye at the mention of Yen that tells Eskel everything he needs to know, so he stops off at the liquor store on the way home.

Lambert and Geralt are already waiting at his apartment when he gets there, Temerian food from the _New Narakort_ in a bag dangling from Geralt’s hand. It has become their Friday night tradition: after they finish at the gym, they head back to Eskel’s to talk training, analyse last weekend’s competition footage, and just generally hang out.

Lambert raises an eyebrow at the brown paper bag in Eskel’s arm, its contents betrayed by the sound of clinking glass. “Booze, Eskel? What are we celebrating?”

Eskel shrugs as he pulls the door key from his pocket, but Lambert catches the glance he shoots at Geralt.

“Oh, I see,” Lambert says, as it dawns on him. “ _That’s_ why you were so snippy this afternoon. The white wolf is a lone wolf again.”

They follow Eskel into his apartment, kicking off their shoes in the small entrance hallway.

Lambert imitates the deep, posh voice of a documentary narrator. “On the hunt once more, seeking the female of its species -”

Geralt narrows his eyes. “Fuck off, Lambert.”

Lambert smirks as he closes the door behind him, but he bites back his sarcastic retort.

They eat sitting around the scratched, wobbly Ikea table in Eskel’s small kitchen, a Spotify playlist of rock music emanating from Geralt’s phone. The empty takeaway containers have landed in the bin by the time they finish dissecting the recent spate of victories by Nilfgaardian fencers. There is a lull in the conversation; normally, at this point in the evening, they might turn to YouTube for videos of competition bouts, or discuss the progress of younger fencers at the club.

Instead, Eskel takes the first bottle of White Hunt vodka from the freezer and fills three shot glasses.

“Na zdrowie, men,” Lambert says, raising his glass, then downing its contents in one swift mouthful. Eskel and Geralt follow suit, echoing his toast.

“Na zdrowie.”

“Na zdrowie.”

The shot leaves a freezer-cold trail down Eskel’s throat and into his stomach, replaced, almost immediately, by a warm blaze that smooths some of the tension from his shoulders.

“Damn, that’s good,” he says, with satisfaction.

“Fuck yeah,” Geralt agrees.

Lambert is already reaching for the bottle to refill their glasses. “Why don’t we do this more often?”

Eskel snorts. “Because you like winning, and you hate fencing with a hangover.”

“Like that Cat School fencer last year,” Geralt says with a grin. “You guys remember the World Cup in Vizima, right? I was supposed to fence him in the first round.”

“He’s the one who didn’t show, right?” Lambert says.

Geralt nods. “They had the men’s epee the day before the sabre event. A Nilfgaardian epeeist won gold and supposedly Gaetan was out celebrating in Little Mahakaman all night. He was too hungover to even turn up and spent all morning crouched over a toilet bowl instead.”

The memory comes back to Eskel in a series of images. He has been warming up for his own bout when the sound of raised voices draws his attention to a piste across the gym. A referee is doing his best to calm down a red-faced, bald man in a black-and-yellow Nilfgaardian team jacket. Geralt stands to the side, arms crossed, mask and sabre at his feet, a lone sabreur waiting for his opponent.

“I’ve never seen anyone as angry as that coach when he realised his best fencer was about to be disqualified,” Eskel says.

Geralt grins. “I’m not complaining. Easiest bout I’ve ever had at a World Cup.”

“Wasn’t that the World Cup that Yen went shopping?” Lambert asks. He adopts a high-pitched, whiny voice that is an unflattering imitation of the violet-eyed epeeist. “Geralt, I’m angry about something stupid and petty, so I’m not going to watch you win the gold-medal bout.”

Geralt narrows his eyes at the hook-nosed sabreur, but he downs another shot instead of telling him to shut up, so Eskel figures it might finally be safe to broach the topic.

“What actually happened this time?”

The white-haired sabreur grimaces, and runs a hand over the stubble on his cheek. “Some asshole ex of hers is visiting town. So a couple of weeks ago, Yen goes to have brunch with him, for “old times’ sake,” then suddenly it turns out she’s _fucking_ him and she can’t decide who she likes better, me or this guy.”

“Fuck,” Lambert says. For once, he makes no sarcastic remark. “That’s messed up.”

Geralt nods grimly. “I’m not going to just sit by and wait until she chooses one of us. So I just walked out. Made the choice easy for her. We’re done.”

There is a pause as the sabreurs reflect on this latest turn of events in the long, twisted saga that is Geralt and Yen’s relationship. Eskel has had a front-row seat to the drama for long enough to know this probably isn’t the end, whatever Geralt might say now. But, like every time, he hopes he’s wrong. Yen might be gorgeous, and smart, and a talented pentathlete; but she takes his oldest friend for granted, and the way she orders him around puts his teeth on edge.

Then again, this latest transgression is not exactly unprecedented, and he’s pretty sure it was the other way around last time. And the time before that – and the time before _that_ , when Yen found out that Geralt had been seeing a girl on his trips to Novigrad…

Lambert splashes more vodka into their glasses, interrupting Eskel’s thoughts. He’s already lost count – maybe they should slow down...

“May the other guy’s balls shrivel up and his cock fall off,” the younger man says with a mocking grin, raising his glass.

Geralt’s mouth twists. “That’s a toast I can get behind.”

Eskel raises his own glass in agreement, then downs the vodka, suppressing a shudder at the bitter taste. The bottle has been sitting on the table for some time now, and is no longer as cold as it needs to be, especially considering he can only afford to buy the bottom-shelf labels.

Lambert refills their glasses again, and Eskel realises they are already at the end of the first bottle – boy, is he going to regret this tomorrow. Maybe they should slow down.

But the alcohol tingles under his skin, as gentle as Triss’ fingers tracing the contours of his chest. He really quite likes the feeling – and anyway, the last time he had a hangover it wasn’t _that_ bad, was it?

 _Just a few more,_ he decides. Why did he buy two bottles, if not to drink them?

“Here’s to Yen’s bad judgement,” Eskel says, and drains his glass again, Geralt and Lambert following suit a moment later. He stands and pulls the second bottle from the freezer, where it has been chilling.

“Enough about fucking Yen,” Geralt says, putting down his empty glass with a snap. He is not slurring his words yet, but there is an unfocused look in his hazel eyes as he fixes them on Lambert. “Eskel said something, back at that party in December. You were chatting up that Nilfgaardian sabreur. Adam? Alan? You take him home, or what?”

“Aiden,” Lambert corrects automatically, “and we went back to his-”. He cuts off abruptly, his mouth twisting as if he hadn’t meant to divulge anything. Geralt grins.

“You still seeing him?” Eskel asks, intrigued by Lambert’s reticence. The brash sabreur is normally open about his occasional partners – often in far too much detail for Eskel’s tastes. But when it comes to romance, Lambert is tight-lipped, preferring to hide anything that could be construed as _feelings_ behind a defensive shell of cynicism.

“He went back to Nilfgaard in January,” Lambert says, not really answering the question.

Geralt narrows his eyes. “Hold on… we were there two weeks ago for the Nilfgaard International. Is _that_ where you kept disappearing to in the evenings?”

Lambert’s glare is an admission. “Fuck you,” he says.

Geralt chuckles, unperturbed. “Well, at least one of us is getting laid regularly.”

The words are out of Eskel’s mouth before he has considered them.

“Two, actually,” he says, then regrets it almost immediately. Geralt and Lambert turn to look at him, surprise on their faces.

“Eskel, Eskel,” Lambert says after a moment, his tone mildly impressed. “Still waters run deep. How long have you been keeping that to yourself?”

“Who is it?” Geralt adds with interest.

Eskel resists the urge to scratch the scar on his lip. It always itches when he feels self-conscious.

“She’ll kill me if she finds out you know,” he says. He doesn’t know why he’s telling them this. He should have kept it to himself. “But – it’s Triss. The foilist with the red hair. She joined the club last September.”

“She’s Yen’s friend, right?” Geralt raises an eyebrow. “Good for you, man. She’s gorgeous.”

Lambert frowns. “Why should she care if we find out?”

“We’re not really… it’s not really official,” Eskel says.

He takes a breath, and considers how to explain … well, how to explain whatever it is he has with Triss. It’s been, what, ten, twelve times since that party in December? Always unplanned, but he’s started keeping condoms in his fencing bag just in case. They run into each other at the club a couple of times a week; his Tuesday and Thursday lessons with Vesemir are at the same time as the foil classes. Sometimes they’ll just chat for a while, if she’s waiting for an opponent to fence, or for a piste to free up; but sometimes she’ll smile _that_ smile, the one that lights up her face and makes his heart race, and then she’ll quietly ask him what his plans are that evening, and whether he wants to come over for some takeaway and maybe some Netflix or whatever.

They’re not exactly _dates_ , although he has more fun with her than on any date he’s ever been on.

He’s under no illusions, though. She’s told him she’s not looking for a boyfriend, not with the amount of time she has to spend studying for law school. He’d be a pretty terrible boyfriend anyway, considering the amount of time he spends on the road, fencing on the international competition circuit.

But Melitele knows he’d take her out to dinner in a heartbeat, if she wanted to.

“I guess you’d say we’re just kinda… sleeping together, sometimes,” Eskel says, finally.

“Since when?” Geralt prods.

“Since Vesemir’s party, in December.” Eskel shrugs. “She’s busy with her studies, and I’m away at a competition every couple of weeks, so I guess it kinda works for us.”

Lambert snorts. “You’re kidding, right? You’re the most old-fashioned out of all of us. All full of feelings, and shit. It might be what she wants, but like fuck is it what you want.”

“You’re one to talk,” Eskel snaps. Lambert’s barb has hit home, and there is a tightness in his chest that he doesn’t want to examine. He downs another shot instead, the blaze down his throat fuelling his annoyance. “What about you and Aiden? You only hold back on the details of who you’ve fucked when you actually _care_ about whoever it is. No matter how much you might try to bury it.”

Lambert opens his mouth to retort, but Geralt cuts him off before he can get a word out.

“Shut up, both of you,” he says. He frowns each of them in turn. “Don’t ruin this by being a dick, Lambert. And Eskel, don’t take this the wrong way, but he was just telling you to be careful. Look out for yourself. That’s all.”

Lambert glowers, and Eskel sighs, but neither says anything as the white-haired sabreur pours them another round. He’s right, of course. This evening was supposed to be about helping Geralt to forget Yen. Instead, they’ve spent half of it talking about themselves. Some friends they are.

“We’re well on the way to being shitfaced,” Geralt says, a more cheerful note in his voice. “So let’s finish this properly.” He raises his glass in a toast. “Here’s to you two, for putting up with me and Yen for all of these years.”

Eskel tries to put Triss from his mind as he downs the shot. It’s surprisingly easy; his head is swimming pleasantly, and he has to focus on Geralt’s words to understand them. He supposes this is what it is like to drown your feelings in alcohol; he’ll deal with them later, or maybe never.

In some ways, the three of them are not that different.

Eskel glances at Lambert and Geralt, feeling an unexpected surge of kinship for his two friends. Lambert’s dark eyes are unfocused, but no longer angry, and his usual mocking half-smile is back in place. Geralt’s eyes are narrowed in drunken concentration as he pours another round, moving slowly and carefully so as not to spill any vodka. There is only half a bottle left, now.

Lambert grins.

“I’ve got an idea. There’s this game called _Never have I ever…_ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> These boys sure like to have a drink or two...
> 
> Also, I'd just like to point out that things never end well when the White Hunt is involved.


End file.
